Shotgun Daddy

Mixed

When I've written about books or movies on this site in the past, it's usually been because someone has sent me something to review or because I've wanted to share something I found entertaining or interesting.

This time is different.

Photographer Kip Fulbeck has just released Mixed: Portraits of Multiracial Kids, a collection of photos of children who don't fit into the boxes that society (and census forms) used to insist on placing them in.  The photographs are beautiful, and not just because the children are beautiful, resplendent in all colors.  Fulbeck's lens captures the personalities behind the portraits: a boy and his guitar, a girl and her retainer, two twins dancing with joy.  Most importantly, every child is an individual, every child -- save a few who are fussy -- is smiling and happy.

And that's what Fulbeck is trying to tell us.  Sure, these children are all beautiful -- as you turn the pages you will be struck by honey-brown eyes, softly curling hair, and skin tones ranging from café au lait to warm cocoa.  But beneath all of that, these are still just kids.  (But don't just take my word for it, visit Fulbeck's website and click VIDEO to see some of the photographs and listen as Fulbeck describes his project.)

There was no book like this when I was a child.  For much of my youth, the only biracial person in my life was the face looking back at me in the mirror, and I struggled with my cultural identity until I was almost thirty years old.  I even rejected the "mixed" label, simply because I didn't like the way it sounded.  

Because of all this, my wife and I were excited to take Alison, Henry, and Kate to an open call photo shoot for the book about a year ago.  A few dozen families were there, and even though I had never met any of them before, they all seemed somewhat familiar.  A black father would hand a musubi to his hungry child, a white mother would comb the kinks out of her daughter's nappy hair, and the air was filled with conversations describing intricate family trees.  It was a blessing just to be in the room.

The book was released this week, and Alison's photo was included.  (You can also see her in the video mentioned above.)  What a difference a generation makes.  When I was ten years old, I didn't know anyone else like me, but today my ten-year-old daughter's smiling face can be found on the pages of a book celebrating multi-racial children.  

Absolutely amazing.

The Double-Edged Facebook Sword

Okay, here's the thing.  I love Facebook.  I got on board early, about two years ago, and it's been pretty amazing.  My stories probably aren't any different than your stories, but I'll tell them anyway.  

I grew up in four different cities in Michigan, Illinois, and California, and each time we moved I left a group of friends behind, presumably never to be heard from again.  Enter Facebook.  I made contact with my very first best friend, the girl who lived across the street from me in Michigan when I was five years old, and a few months later I found my next best friend, a guy who lived two doors from me in Irvine, California, during my early teens.  I've reconnected with dozens of friends from two different high schools, and even more from college.  In fact, just last year, in a shining example of the magic of Facebook, I was shopping at the mall when I ran into a friend that I hadn't seen for more than twenty-five years.  If we hadn't friended each other earlier that same week, we never would've recognized each other.

I'm in constant touch with countless friends, and even though the news I get from them is about what they had for dinner or how many goals their children scored in the Saturday soccer game, it's still news, and I still feel like I'm in their lives.

I love Facebook.

But I also hate Facebook.  Here's why.

1. The Friend Collector

This is the person who has 874 friends and gains some sort of validation from this number.  Just because our daughters played soccer together four years ago, we do not need to be friends.

2. The Networker

There was a large girl who lived in the dorm next door during my freshman year of college.  She wasn't overweight, just large.  Warrior princess large.  Since her shoulders were wider than mine, and since we weren't very nice, we started referring to her as the Linebacker.  She and I had lots of friends in common, but I'm fairly positive that we never spoke a single word to each other.  We are now friends on Facebook, and I have no idea why.  The whole thing makes me feel dirty.

3. The Hawker

If I get one more suggestion to buy Girl Scout cookies through Facebook, I think I'll scream.  Come to think of it, I'm really looking forward to the day when I can walk into a grocery store without being accosted by seven-year-olds pushing Thin Mints and Tagalongs, but I digress.

4. The Minutiae Monitor

I don't need to know that you just finished folding your socks.  I don't need to know that you're watering the lawn.  And I really don't need to know that you're bored.  This is painfully obvious.

5. The Complainers

Facebook changes a lot.  Deal with it.

6. The Peer Pressurers

96% of the people reading this will agree with me, but only 22% of them will copy and paste this as their status to spread the word of this cause.  Are you one of the 22%?

7. The Secret Keepers

I don't really care what color your bra is.  Okay, maybe I do.  

8. The Game Players

I have never played, and will never play, Mafia Wars, Bejeweled, or whatever else it is that you might be interested in.  Please don't invite me, and please don't tell me that you've rescued a motherless possum while searching for brass knuckles in the parlor with Colonel Mustard.  Stop it.

9. The Exhibitionists

This is a big one.  If I am related to you, please do not post nude photos of yourself.  Seriously.

So there you have it Facebookers.  If you fall into any of those categories, now you know why you've mysteriously disappeared from my friend list.  Which reminds me of #10.

10. The Rebounders

If we were friends once upon a time, but then you notice that we aren't anymore, please don't send me another friend request.  You were probably removed for a reason.

The Planet 51 Giveaway!

In order to help promote today's DVD and Blu-Ray release of Planet 51, the good folks at Sony Pictures Home Entertainment have asked me to help them out with a giveaway.  So if you've got a PlayStation3 (and if you don't, you really should), all you have to do to get in on the action is leave a comment to this post and be sure to include the number 51 in whatever clever thing you have to say.  Also, be sure to leave your email address so I can get in touch with you when you win!

The contest will close 51 hours from right now -- or 5:00 AM Pacific time on Thursday morning.  Good luck!

Funeral for a Friend

 We always had pets as I was growing up, mainly cats, and I have vague memories of their passing.  I'm sure I was sad at the time, but if I were an oak tree and you were to cut me open and look at the rings on my trunk, you'd see no evidence of trauma.  Those deaths didn't stay with me.

I had a dog, though.  Every boy should have a dog.  We found Max at the pound during the spring of my sixth grade year, and he was my best friend for the next decade of my life.  I was in my mid-20s when he died, and I'll never forget saying goodbye to him.  He had passed during the night at a kennel, so when I saw him the next morning he was stretched out on a metal table in a sterile examination room.  I bent over and brushed my face against his fur one last time and whispered into his ear, "I hope I have a son one day, and I hope that he has a dog who's as good a friend as you were to me."  I took his collar from his neck and slipped it into my pocket.  Fifteen years later, the collar hangs on a nail in my garage, and the scar on my heart still hasn't healed.

This is how it is with children and their pets.  The death of a hamster or goldfish or parakeet can be just as traumatic as the passing of a blood relative, or even more so.  Knowing this, we've always hesitated to bring animals into our home.  We've avoided the goldfish offered as "prizes" at elementary school carnivals and resisted the constant cries for a dog, but loyal readers will remember that last summer we allowed Alison to raise some tadpoles.  Two of the tadpoles actually became bullfrogs, but after one jumped out of the tank, only one remained -- Kirby.

Kirby died on Wednesday night.

The details aren't important, except to say that frogs -- like hamsters and goldfish and parakeets -- sometimes just die.  Alison was already asleep when we discovered him, so we chose to hide the truth until Thursday after school.  I asked her to sit next to me on the couch, and I told her quickly before she could wonder what was happening.

"Your frog died last night."

Those simple words brought the world crashing down around us as she immediately began crying.  She never asked why or how, probably because those details didn't matter to her.  Her frog was gone.

She slid from my arms into Leslie's, and I noticed that her socks had frogs on them.

Because things don't always go exactly as planned, Kate wandered out and was immediately worried when she saw her older sister sobbing in her mother's arms.

"What's wrong with Allie?"

"Her frog died last night."

"He's not coming back to life?"

"No."

She gave Alison a little rub on her back, and then ran to her room, returning almost immediately with a stuffed frog.

"This is my frog!"  And then she started hopping around the room and ribbet-ing as her sister continued crying.  Perhaps not the most sympathetic gesture ever.

Alison decided she wanted to bury him, so we slipped Kirby into a perfectly sized cardboard box coffin and headed out to the flower bed in the front yard.  As the entire family gathered around, I dug a small hole and Alison gently deposited her friend into the ground.  I said something about what a good frog Kirby had been, and then explained that at funerals the loved ones usually put the first few shovels of dirt back into the grave.  Alison took the trowel and pushed a bit of soil onto the box, but quickly gave in to the tears and asked me to finish.  I fully expect to see a red fern growing there in the spring.

But things brightened after the funeral.  When we came back in the house, we asked Alison if she thought she might like to get another frog.  Twenty minutes later we were at the pet shop, peering into terrariums at frogs of all shapes, sizes, and colors.  She chose two, a green tree frog and a grey tree frog, and the new additions have definitely filled the hole in her heart.  She named them Sticky and Jumpy.

In the span of an hour or so, we saw the beauty of being nine years old.  At five o'clock her world was shattered, and we were powerless to put the pieces back together.  By 6:30 Alison had fallen in love all over again.  Who needs a prince when you've got a frog or two hopping around?